


she loves to be one of the girls

by cashewdani



Category: Glee
Genre: F/M, House Party, Infidelity, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-05-21
Updated: 2009-05-21
Packaged: 2018-01-15 02:38:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1288135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cashewdani/pseuds/cashewdani
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Their footsteps sound too loud, that’s what she’s thinking when he asks her, “Hey, what are you doing on Friday?”</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	she loves to be one of the girls

“I just don’t see why we can’t do something by _ABBA_!” Kurt is obsessed with _ABBA_ recently, and even Mr. Schuester telling him they did “Take a Chance on Me” during his own sophomore year is not enough to discourage him.

“Everyone is sick of that _ABBA_ shit,” Mercedes says, rolling her eyes. “That _Devil Wears Prada_ lady killed it. For good. I ain’t singing it.”

Rachel hates to do it, but she thinks she agrees with Mercedes. _ABBA_ is so not what they need if they’re hoping to win anything except a participation trophy. “We need something bigger.”

“Well, what if we somehow arrange their “S.O.S.” with _The Jonas Brother_ ’s song with the same title?”

“Kurt, seriously, I got Puck and those guys to stop kicking your ass, but if you keep this up, I’m going to have to start. Really. Keep it a little less gay. Just a little.” Finn’s started coming to practice after football drills, so he’s always kind of sweaty and exhausted, and just mostly sits off to the side unless they tell him to do something. Rachel thinks it’s a little disrespectful, but this is apparently the only way they’re going to be able to keep him showing up.

Tina takes a break from detailing her Chuck Taylors to say, “I still don’t get why we had to take “U and UR Hand” off the list.”

“It’s a song about masturbating! Ok, we will not be doing a song about masturbating at nationals, I don’t care how edgy or cool you think we need to be, Tina, we’re not doing it!” It’s already close to five, and they haven’t managed to agree on a single song other than “Don’t Stop Believin’” and Rachel just kind of wants to go home and listen to “A Chorus Line” until she remembers why she’s in this stupid club to begin with.

“What about “Baba O’Reilly?”” Finn asks. “Artie, you told me you can play that.”

“Yeah, but I don’t want to be playing the guitar on every song we do.”

“Artie’s right,” Rachel replies. “Plus, St. Margaret’s did it last year.” She clenches her fists and groans in frustration. “We’re never going to be able to do this.”

“Everyone take out your Ipods.” Finn says, digging into his own practice bag, while they all kind of just stare dumbfounded at someone other than Rachel telling them to do something. “Seriously, take them out.”

“And what are we going to do with them once they’re out, QB?” Mercedes wants to know.

“You’re going to listen to them. And you’re going to find those songs that make you want to dance along when they come on in your car, or when you’re alone in a room. Those songs that make you feel something. Because they’ll probably make someone else feel something too.”

And Rachel has no idea why, but listening to him say it, she kind of wants to cry. Like she can’t believe she’s hearing this from a guy who up until a few days ago got all of his joy from throwing around a ball. “That, um, that works.”

“Make a list and then we’ll see if we get anything out of it.”

Less than an hour later they’ve decided to learn “Dance, Dance”, “Mr. Brightside”, “Wonderwall” and “All the Single Ladies” if they can figure out a way to do it that doesn’t look like the _Saturday Night Live_ sketch.

+++

“That was really cool, what you did today,” Rachel tells him while they’re walking out of the auditorium. He’s the only one that stayed to help her put away all the folding chairs and equipment. Well, Artie offered, and she knows it’s politically correct to say he’s differently abled, but there’s no way he’d be of any assistance to her in moving furniture.

“Oh, yeah? Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.” She moves to take her hair out of the ponytail she just put it in a few minutes ago and wishes she had a way to check her reflection to make sure it still looks okay.

“I just tried to think about why I wanted to sing with you guys in the first place.”

“And that was it?”

“That was it.”

Rachel’s been in these hallways at night so many times before: when they were doing rehearsals for _Mame_ , and before the talent show last semester, and during the months her piano instructor’s house was being remodeled so he organized lessons in the band room, but this is the first time she’s ever felt on edge about it.

Their footsteps sound too loud, that’s what she’s thinking when he asks her, “Hey, what are you doing on Friday?”

“Excuse me?”

“This Friday night, what are you doing?”

She’s probably going to watch _Some Like it Hot_ with Daddy because he just got it from Netflix, but she doesn’t want to say that. “I don’t know, why?”

“Well, Puck’s having the Homecoming party, and Quinn’s going to be doing some youth group prayer thing so I thought maybe we could go.”

She stops dead in her tracks and almost drops her geometry book. "Do you think this is _Pretty in Pink_ or something?"

"What is that?" 

"You've seriously never heard of that movie? How is that possible?!" Rachel can’t believe that maybe she was starting to like him earlier.

"Look, what else are you going to be doing? Changing the background on your Youtube page? Go with me."

"Finn, I don't want to go to Puck's stupid Homecoming party with you."

"But it's Homecoming!"

"So what? I don't go to this party with you, the team's going to lose the game or something?"

"It could happen. And what if that gets me too depressed to perform?" He’s smiling at her like he’s teasing, and she feels all indignant but interested at the same time. 

"Don’t joke about that."

“I wouldn’t have to joke if you just say you’d go.”

She thinks about snuggling up on the couch with Daddy, or making kettle corn with Papa like every Friday night since she stopped getting invited to sleepovers. And how it's nice, but also really, really sad. “I’ll go,” she says.

“Seriously? It's going to be awesome. We’re going to have a good time, I promise.” 

She hopes he’s right, and this isn’t going to wind up being just another event she draws on when she’s trying to cry authentically.

+++

He shows up at 8 on Friday, after texting her six times to make sure she’s still on board, and those little 140 character messages have gotten her even more nervous than she was before.

She swore she wasn’t going to do this, but she changed her clothes more than once, and painted her toenails. Papa told her she looked nice with a knowing look in his eye moments before the doorbell rang, and Rachel kept sighing while saying, “He has a girlfriend, and no it’s not me!”

Finn shakes hands with both her fathers, and calls them sir, and let’s them know that he’ll bring her home safely at the end of the night. Rachel is smiling so hard that she can’t even turn it off.

In his car, he’s listening to _Foreigner_ , and she watches him keep beat with his fingers against the steering wheel. It’s comfortable, being here with him, and she hopes this isn’t the high point of the evening.

+++

When they walk in the door, she’s half expecting the music to turn off, and for everyone to pivot to stare at them with their mouths open. Or for someone to pour a beer on her at the very least. But, nothing happens. Well, Finn does put his hand on the small of her back and lead her towards the spiked bowl of punch, but that’s it.

“To trying new things,” he toasts, and Rachel knows she’s in trouble.

+++

They played a round of beer pong against Mike and Eric, who she’s gone to school with for two years, but who have never spoken to her, and even though Finn was drinking all of her cups, she had at least another two servings of punch. And they danced back towards the corner of the room because she didn’t want any of Quinn’s friends to see them and get the wrong idea, and there was some more punch, and now they’re sitting on what she thinks is Puck’s parents’ bed.

She’s drunk, but just the giggly kind of drunk where she bats her eyes a lot and thinks everything is hysterical. Like she would get at night at sleepaway camp when her bunkmate Katie managed to have her sister smuggle them in some flavored vodka.

“I can’t believe you got smashed! This is amazing!” Finn keeps saying, his face kind of flushed himself.

“Whatever, I’m not a fun Nazi. I like fun.”

“A fun Nazi! Rach, oh my GOD!” And at that moment, she knocks over this gigantic bag of M&Ms that Finn found in the pantry while looking for more cups, and she honestly thinks she might start crying she’s laughing so hard.

He’s trying to catch them as they cascade off the bedspread, yelling, “Don’t lose the green ones!”

“Why the green ones?”

“They’re an aphrodisiac.” Finn nods like this is the most serious thing in the world.

“That’s a myth.”

“Is it, Rach? Do you know for certain that it’s a myth?”

“Snopes says it’s a myth.”

“I don’t know who Snopes is, but he’s a liar. Here, we’re proving him wrong.” He holds a green M&M up to her lips, and his fingers are warm, and she maybe unintentionally bites them a little bit while she’s taking the candy into her mouth.

She hears him inhale, and watches his pupils get a little wider, and wants to kiss him, this boy she hadn’t even known a month ago who has a girlfriend.

“My turn,” Finn says, in a whisper, like they’re sharing a secret, popping a few of the candies onto his tongue.

“Is it working?” she wants to know, her heart picking up from a lot more than an urban legend.

“It’s hard to tell.”

“Yeah,” Rachel sighs, and their faces are getting closer and closer, and then Finn’s kissing her. She’s kissing a football player at a party she was invited to, and he has a beautiful voice, and his mouth tastes likes chocolate, and this is maybe the greatest night that Rachel can even remember.

Better even than when she met Bernadette Peters outside the stage doors of “Annie Get Your Gun” on that trip to New York.

But she’s not stupid, she doesn’t think this necessarily means anything other than they’re drunk, and they have some things in common, and that his girlfriend is going to save herself until she has a ring on her finger. She can still be smart, and enjoy this.

Rachel might perform on stage because she’s talented, and she likes it, but mostly because deep down she wants people to love her. Right now, with Finn’s hands mussing her hair, and the way that he groans when she pulls him closer, she feels that kind of loved.

They kiss for what seems like a really long time, and then she says, “Okay, maybe it’s not a myth,” and he laughs into the curve of her neck, all warm and boyish.

“I’m really happy you joined glee club.”

“I’m really happy I did too.” The words are right along her pulse point, and she realizes that she’s going to suggest they put “Let’s Hear It For the Boy” back on the possibilities list, even though she’s the one that took it off in the first place.


End file.
